Carp In the Area - Does it Matter?

[flyingmonkie]

I treat grass carp spawning/flopping as a bad indicator, and more often than not, will find a new place to fish.  Is there anything to this?

[scaleface]

There is this slough I use to fish full of carp . Twice I caught big bass trying to snag a carp by ripping a jerkbait through a school of them . 

[flyingmonkie]

23 minutes ago, scaleface said:

There is this slough I use to fish full of carp . Twice I caught big bass trying to snag a carp by ripping a jerkbait through a school of them . 

Interesting.  So that's one vote for "no, there's nothing to it, keep it simple stupid!"

[Bluebasser86]

If there are spawning carp I'm going somewhere else. I've tried fishing around them time and time again and very rarely get bit and it's never a fish worth the headache. 

Feeding carp on the other hand are almost always worth trying by, especially if there's smallmouth for some reason. I'm guessing the carp rooting around the bottom are stirring up craws and other prey items and the bass are picking off the easy meals. 

[nascar2428]

I totally avoid the carp commotion.

[loudcherokee]

This is happening in my neck of the woods as we speak. I've heard from 2 or 3 other fisherman, older guys, say that when the carp are making all that commotion the bass don't bite.

LC

[avidone1]

There are regions I have fished in where carp were everywhere.

Trying to avoid them while bass fishing, is like fishing while trying to avoid water.

never worked well for me.

[scaleface]

Roland Martin once made a television show bass fishing on a carp and gar pattern .

[Raul]

To me the answer is no, it doesn´t matter if there are carp around.

[Freak78]

My favorite pond to fish is full of carp. It seems everytime I go they are making a commotion and I still catch fish. Everything from dinks to 5 pounders. I often catch them just off the same cattails the carp are splashing in.

[blckshirt98]

Pretty much every single body of water out west here has a population of carp in them. I wish we could bowfish for carp because they cruise in packs near the shoreline all the time.

[lo n slo]

the carp usually move in to spawn after the bass do but it isn't written in stone that all the bass leave the shallows altogether. i give them their space anyway. 

[Psychofish]

I was flipping and pitching boat docks/slips in a marina the other day at a lake that has a VERY healthy carp population. I was trying to trick a smaller bass into striking as he was hugging a support beam. Suddenly three much larger carp came swimming by, he shot out and into the middle of them scaring them off, then returned to his position. I thought that was interesting to observe.

[loudcherokee]

5 minutes ago, Psychofish said:

I was flipping and pitching boat docks/slips in a marina the other day at a lake that has a VERY healthy carp population. I was trying to trick a smaller bass into striking as he was hugging a support beam. Suddenly three much larger carp came swimming by, he shot out and into the middle of them scaring them off, then returned to his position. I thought that was interesting to observe.

I noticed similar behavior at my lake. There were a bunch of bass in a culvert that would chase off some roaming carp everytime they came near. Couldn't get them to bite anything.

LC

[N Florida Mike]

We have some big grass carp(I snagged a 23 pounder last year.) I watch them patrolling off my dock and often catch bass with them around.They don't seem to effect the bass any.

["hamma"]

Bad indicator? in what sense? their mere presence doesn't hurt, until they eat all that grass bass have been using for cover. Usually they kick stuff up which in turn brings in baitfish, then bass. Ive caught some big bass around carp, but then yet i've seen lakes turn baron for grass cover due to carps introduction.

[Neil McCauley]

Ruins everything imo. I refuse to fish on waters with heavy carp infestations. I say, if legal, bring a suppressed .22LR and kill them all.

[the reel ess]

I fish a couple places with so many carp it's not worth trying to get away. The bass are captive so I imagine they're used to the carp.

 

My friends bought some sterile grass carp for their pond. The carp got huge, yet there's still a lot of grass in the pond. Hmmm...

[hoosierbass07]

I went kayak fishing last week at a small strip pit pond and as usual during the spring I saw giant shadows in the water.  Big giant carp.  I would love to catch one from my kayak. Those things look huge.  

[geo g]

In south Florida with all the heavy vegetation we have some huge carp.  I have foul hooked two over the years and the big one was quite a thrill.  It took me on a ride, pulling drag for what seemed like minutes.  Since it was foul hooked control was a problem.

[YoungPlug]

On 4/19/2016 at 11:14 PM, flyingmonkie said:

I treat grass carp spawning/flopping as a bad indicator, and more often than not, will find a new place to fish.  Is there anything to this?

My favorite pond in the area is full of grass carp, still have good numbers of 3-5 pound bass. If you ask me once I see Chain Pickerel I start to get worried about bass populations more than anything just because of what has happened to my home lake/pond.

[Dan N]

Was just fishing where a bunch of carp are spalshing around spawning. First bass came within seconds of 3 large carp passing by the exact spot

[throttleplate]

4 hours ago, Dan N said:

Was just fishing where a bunch of carp are spalshing around spawning. First bass came within seconds of 3 large carp passing by the exact spot

huge carp in the culvert we were fishing the other day, we counted 6 of them just swimming around in pairs 10-15 feet in front of us. Wife caught 25 bass and 4 panfish with these huge carp and i also caught my share so they arnt a problem here.

[Fred Allen]

Had my BEST day of the year for large mouths and there were carp wrestling and splashing all over the place. Small 50 acre lake like 5 feet of water and weeds over 80% of water. Had to use frogs because weeds. 

[CrankFate]

If you can imitate the sound of carp underwater, during the bass spawn, the bass will go crazy.